All Mourinho’s instincts will be to kill the game but going for broke represents his best chance of another famous win

When people said they wanted José Mourinho to make Manchester United more like Alex Ferguson’s treble winners, this, presumably, isn’t quite what they meant. The capacity to fight back, to score late goals and to win games that have seemed lost is undoubtedly a useful one, but it does raise major questions about how Mourinho should approach Sunday’s Manchester derby.

Wednesday’s victory at Juventus was the third time in the last six games that United have found a winner in the final five minutes, but it was also the fifth time in those six matches that they had conceded the opening goal of the game. It is as though they need the release of going behind to commit to attack – and this unbalanced squad is far more set up to attack than to defend. At Chelsea, and to a lesser extent against Everton, United suffered when, having secured a lead, they then tried to defend it.